World Doesn't Have To Spin
by spheeris1
Summary: One-shot :: Slight spoiler s for June/July :: Marissa POV :: A kiss can awaken a princess. It can awaken a lawyer, too. :: Minx, of course


**Okay. I seriously had to get this out of my system. Plus, I do love me some Minx. This pairing, like all those I adore, will probably end up disappointing me – but whatever.**

***If you have not read any spoilers for June/July, then some of the things I allude to in the first & second bits could possibly spoil you. You've been warned.**

**Onward.**

/ /

It was something about his hands.

Because she knew where this night was going – from the room rented and the flowers all around and the candles lit – everything was laid out like a scene from a romance novel.

All that was missing were the requisite billowing curtains.

She knew what this night would be about and she walked through that door willingly. She walked into his arms and she walked into his kisses. She thought it was time to make good on these wishes in her heart – not so much focus on the face opposite her but on the family she would gain with returning to J.R. – she thought it was time to get what she wanted.

But it was something about his hands, though.

Those hands were going where they had roamed before and it should have felt wonderful. Or, at the very least, those hands should have conveyed feelings of familiarity and safety.

Those hands should have made Marissa sink even further into J.R.'s touch.

She didn't sink, though.

She fled.

/ /

The wounds were minimal this time around, much more superficial, and so she could lick them clean without feeling bereft. There was annoyance at falling for the same old lines and the same old tricks. There was disappointment that her daydreams seemed destined to remain unrealized.

But there was also the sensation of finally being free of this yolk in the form of a man she once shared her life with.

There was a sense of being cut loose – a boat no longer tethered to the dock – and Marissa no longer saw that elusive horizon as the finish line…

…She saw the whole of the sea and was ready to dive in again.

J.R. could sleep with whoever he wanted to. J.R. could be jealous and manipulative and childish for the rest of his days. J.R. could fade into obscurity and Marissa wouldn't shed a tear.

It wasn't anger either.

It was the beginning of really letting go.

/ /

Dreams don't die, though.

They recede. They go to sleep. They hide and wait to be found again.

She still wanted to be a part of a family – a family more secure than her parents could ever provide. She still wanted to come home, one day, and find a smiling face greeting her. She still wanted to scoop up children and read them bedtime stories.

She still wanted to share a life with someone.

That dream did not die with the end of J.R.

It just slumbered. It just sat patiently for the right one to come along.

/ /

Marissa keeps her heart slightly open but her head is much like a cautious driver – hands at ten and two, eyes on the road and the mirrors.

And if it feels like she cannot get her bearings quickly enough, Marissa turns to Bianca.

She turns to Bianca and grins and the woman returns the gesture. They laugh about something. Then a cell-phone rings and Bianca is gone again, leaving in a rush and leaving Marissa with too much time on her hands.

Too much time to think about how things have not been right between herself and Bianca for a long while now. Too much time to wonder at the why's and ponder the hows. Too much time to notice the absence of closeness that once was and too much time to recognize that something is missing that's been vital in Marissa's life up to this point.

Too much time to think about Bianca Montgomery.

/ /

Life in Pine Valley likes to explode and no one is able to avoid the fall-out.

Babies born under duress or villains at the gate or marriages fraught with adultery – it will all happen with alarming frequency and, sooner or later, it'll be your own drama unfolding in front of everyone.

Marissa has already been down that path, though.

So, when another party goes from good to bad in the blink of an eye, she just refills her glass with wine and leans against the wall to watch the fireworks.

"This isn't going to be pretty."

And there's Bianca, escaping the clutches of Erica Kane for the evening because said clutches are filled up with some kind of fight – a flinging of cutting words that could slice open stone. So, Bianca heads for higher ground and Marissa is very happy to be seen as a hilltop.

And they chit-chat and they glance repeatedly at the mess this party has become and, somewhere along the way, Marissa stops drinking her wine and Bianca drinks more than her fair share.

There is this lazy light in the woman's gaze and Marissa is amused by it; she is a tad bit concerned by it, too, because Bianca is rarely one to forgo propriety. But maybe it is the pressures of another family squabble on display or maybe it is just a long damn day or maybe it is a million other reasons that Marissa is not privy to anymore.

Marissa sighs with that last thought, knowing that this gulf is steadily growing and Bianca won't admit to it and Marissa hasn't found the right questions to ask yet.

"Hey."

Marissa looks over at Bianca's suddenly serious-looking face.

"Hmm?"

Bianca blinks and Marissa feels a slow smile start to wind its way over her lips in return. She is starting to think that Bianca Montgomery is kind of drunk.

"Whatever happens… whatever happens, just don't stop being my friend… okay?"

The smile crumbles from Marissa's mouth in confusion.

And then that confusion is covered up by Bianca's lips.

/ /

It is days later when Marissa decides to acknowledge the fact that, while Bianca delivered that kiss, it was Marissa that was intent on continuing it.

/ /

"I think I like someone, as in **really** like them, and it kind of freaks me out because I should have noticed this attraction earlier. Here I am, though, being jumped from behind by all these **feelings** and I can't even call the one person I want to talk to because they are the **cause** of all this."

Scott looks at her, eyebrows furrowed and head slightly tilted to one side.

"…Excuse me?"

Marissa emits a frustrated groan, falls down onto the park bench and proceeds to bury her head in her hands. There is no use explaining her plight any further. There is no use going into detail.

This is her new universe to travel – and on her own.

This is her latest puzzle to figure out – and in her own time.

"It's not J.R. again, is it?" Scott's nervous inquiry tumbles out from above and Marissa allows a chuckle to cascade off her tongue.

"Nope. It is **definitely** not J.R."

/ /

She isn't the type to shy away from something or someone. And it hasn't always been easy to be the girl who would rather face the truth than save herself some pain by living within lies – but that's just the way she is.

Instability didn't make her weak; it made her a fighter.

She might have lost a couple of rounds along the way. She might have taken some hits that hurt more than others. She might have fallen and thought about staying down.

But she isn't the type to give up; not when victory tastes so sweet.

/ /

There is no real 'plan' to this course of action.

It is merely a chance to confirm all the roaming notions in her brain and settle them for good. And so she strides with purpose, ignoring the cursory looks of strangers and friends alike. She bypasses all the greetings with a brief smile and a wave of her hand.

By the time Bianca turns around, eyes wide and words trying to form, Marissa is cupping the woman's face and pulling Bianca closer. And before either of them can offer up silly excuses or stutter out explanations for the hours upon hours of enforced silence between the two of them, Marissa is the one kissing Bianca this go-around.

/ /

Isn't this the part where it's like planets colliding? Or stars imploding? Waves crashing on the shore?

Isn't this where the Earth shakes and rattles and rolls?

Marissa cannot speak for those idealized forms of what a kiss should feel like, of what love should be like. But once Bianca opens her mouth and that kiss deepens to the point of air being a slight problem, Marissa knows that this kiss is certainly one of the best ones she has ever experienced.

And the world doesn't have to spin any faster to convince her of that.

/ /

**::end::**


End file.
